BSNL IP Ranges
BSNL is Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited, the Government of India telecom operator, and AS9829 is registered with APNIC as BSNL-NIB, the National Internet Backbone, the aut-num carrying an address at 20 Ashoka Road, Sanchar Bhawan, New Delhi. The APNIC RDAP record dates the object's registration to 4 September 2008 and its last change to 25 June 2020, with the registrant entity ORG-BSNL1-AP and abuse routed through the incident-response object IRT-BSNL-IN. Several of the largest blocks this ASN routes are not BSNL allocations at all: APNIC registers them to MTNL, a separate state-owned operator.
- Provider
- BSNL
- Primary ASN
- AS9829
- Category
- ISP
- Headquarters
- New Delhi, India
- Announced IPv4 prefixes
- 1902
- Registry
- APNIC
Known IP ranges
These prefixes are currently announced to the global routing table by AS9829 (BSNL-NIB - National Internet Backbone). Prefix sets change over time - use WHOIS Lookup for the authoritative record on any specific address.
117.202.0.0/16
117.242.0.0/16
182.60.0.0/16
117.195.0.0/16
117.192.0.0/16
117.227.0.0/16
59.183.0.0/16
120.61.0.0/16
117.194.0.0/16
120.60.0.0/16
2001:4490:e00::/39
2001:4490:d00::/40
2001:4490:7900::/40 (IPv6)
What does a BSNL IP mean in a privacy test?
A BSNL address tells you the traffic left an Indian access line, but it does not reliably tell you which company the subscriber pays. Four of the prefixes on this ASN, 59.183.0.0/16, 182.60.0.0/16, 120.60.0.0/16 and 120.61.0.0/16, sit inside APNIC records with netname MTNL and the description Mahanagar Telephone Nigam Limited, maintained by MAINT-IN-IRINN with their own incident-response object IRT-MTNL-IN, and addresses in them answer reverse lookups with names ending mtnl.net.in. The routing data still gives the origin of 182.60.0.0/16 as AS9829 BSNL-NIB, so any tool that stops at the origin ASN files those Mumbai lines under BSNL. The core BSNL allocation, 117.192.0.0/10 with netname BSNL-NET, carries an APNIC remark that it holds IP addresses for the Multiplay network, so broadband, television and voice draw from one pool and the address says nothing about which of them was in use. Lower maintenance on that allocation is MAINT-IN-DOT, the Department of Telecommunications maintainer.
Where BSNL address data actually lives
BSNL publishes no geolocation feed, no allowlist and no customer-facing prefix list, and none of its APNIC objects carries a geofeed attribute. The registry side is where the detail is. The IPv4 parent is 117.192.0.0/10, netname BSNL-NET, status ALLOCATED PORTABLE under ORG-BSNL1-AP, described as NIB (National Internet Backbone), Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited at Statesman House on Barakhamba Road, and carrying the Multiplay remark. The IPv6 parent is 2001:4490::/30, netname BSNLNET-20050922, whose lower maintenance is MAINT-IN-BSNLIPV6 rather than the MAINT-IN-DOT used on the IPv4 side. For routing, the PeeringDB entry is filed as National Internet Backbone India, with a selective peering policy and the IRR set AS9829:AS-BSNL.
The one lookup worth doing before attributing anything on this ASN is the inetnum for the specific address, not the aut-num. That is where the MTNL space separates out: the APNIC record covering 59.176.0.0 to 59.185.255.255, the record for 182.60.0.0/16 and the one covering 120.56.0.0/13 all carry netname MTNL, the description Mahanagar Telephone Nigam Limited, maintainer MAINT-IN-IRINN and the object IRT-MTNL-IN, against IRT-BSNL-IN on BSNL's own space. On most networks the aut-num holder and the inetnum holder are the same company. On AS9829 they routinely are not, which also means the abuse contact you would reach from the ASN is the wrong one for those blocks.
Reading a log line on AS9829
Reverse DNS separates the two operators here, mostly by its absence on one side. Sampled addresses across BSNL's own consumer space, in 117.192.0.0/16, 117.242.0.0/16, 117.195.0.0/16, 117.227.0.0/16, 117.194.0.0/16, 117.222.0.0/16, 59.94.0.0/16 and 106.206.0.0/16, returned no PTR record at all, so a name-based check gives you nothing to work with. The MTNL blocks answer consistently: 120.60.100.5 returns triband-mum-120.60.100.5.mtnl.net.in, 59.183.10.10 returns triband-mum-59.183.10.10.mtnl.net.in and 182.60.200.5 returns static-mum-182.60.200.5.mtnl.net.in, where the leading label marks the product and mum the Mumbai region. One BSNL address sampled did carry a name of its own: 117.202.10.10 returns static.ill.117.202.10.10.bsnl.co.in, whose static label sets it apart from the unnamed dynamic space around it.
The other thing to know is that this is access space rather than hosting. An inbound connection arriving at your server from AS9829 is a person on a fixed or mobile line, and a service answering on one of these addresses is a subscriber running it rather than BSNL hosting something for a customer. Sub-allocation also runs the opposite way from a datacentre network. Instead of BSNL carving blocks out for tenants, it announces whole APNIC allocations belonging to another operator, which is why the prefix boundary carries more information here than the ASN label does.
Related tools
Frequently asked questions
Why is my IP address showing as BSNL?
Because the connection reached the site over an Indian access line that AS9829 announces, with no tunnel carrying it. Before you conclude the line is BSNL's, check the APNIC record for the exact address: a large share of what this ASN routes is registered to MTNL, so the ASN name and the allocation holder can disagree.
Why does an MTNL address get reported as BSNL?
Because MTNL prefixes are announced to the internet under BSNL's AS9829. The APNIC allocation records for those blocks give netname MTNL and the description Mahanagar Telephone Nigam Limited, with maintainer MAINT-IN-IRINN and the incident-response object IRT-MTNL-IN, and their reverse DNS ends in mtnl.net.in, but a tool that resolves an address only to its origin ASN reports BSNL.
Do BSNL addresses have reverse DNS?
Mostly not. Sampled addresses across eight of BSNL's consumer blocks returned no PTR record at all. The MTNL space routed under the same ASN does have consistent names, in the forms triband-mum-address.mtnl.net.in and static-mum-address.mtnl.net.in, so the presence of a name is itself a hint about which operator you are looking at.
Can a VPN or proxy exit run on a BSNL address?
It would be unusual. AS9829 carries subscriber access space rather than rented compute, so there is nothing here to hire as an exit node. A service answering on this ASN is far more likely to be a subscriber running something on their own line, most plausibly on one of the static addresses that carry a bsnl.co.in name.
What is the National Internet Backbone?
It is the name BSNL registered its network under at APNIC. The aut-num for AS9829 carries the as-name BSNL-NIB and the description National Internet Backbone, Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited, at Sanchar Bhawan in New Delhi, and PeeringDB files the same network as National Internet Backbone India. It is the label you will see in whois output, not a separate company.